Dragon
by Pernshinigami
Summary: A one shot to go with Bleach MUSH the beginning, a brief backstory of my character Sakura there... After Sakura gains her shikai, she probes her inner world in search of the reason why her zanpakuto shows two distinctly different personalities


The blonde woman sat in the second division's courtyard. She'd been there for the past several hours, and the sun was going down. The other members of the second division were coming home from day shift and going out to night shift. While the seated officer's duties had long ago ended, she didn't move.

She was deep in meditation, a ring of water rushing around her in circles. Three figures watched her carefully. "She's been there all evening." Aurcan complained. "What's she doing anyway."

A ball of water appeared above the ring of water Sakura had summoned hours ago. The ball began to shift states, water, vapor, ice, water, vapor, ice, seething and writhing.

"You lot get back to your duties." Soi Fong ordered, coming up behind the trio. "You have night shift Rikura. Aurcan you're a mess, go down to the fourth and make sure that last chase didn't take more out of you than it should have. Ayanami, you have dawnshift, you'd better get some sleep. I don't tolerate tardiness." The captain said coldly.

All three shinigami turned and walked away.

"Ryuunami-san." Soi Fong said stiffly.

The girl was too deep in meditation to realize the captain had spoken. "Ryuunami-san!" Soi Fong tried to touch the ring of water. It rose up, forming into a dragon's head, which hissed at her.

Soi Fong unsheathed her zanpakuto, and touched the dragons head with the tip of the blade. All the water Sakura had been working with disappeared and the girl jerked, coming out of the trance she was in.

"You have dawn shift tomorrow. There's an arrancar hiding in the Rocky Mountains and you know American culture better than most."

"G… g… gomen Taichou."

"Ever since you got Shikai you've been diving into your own head after something, what is it you're looking for?"

The girl hesitated. Fong waited. Then Sakura said. "I think my Saeyamaru is hiding something."

"Hiding something?"

"My inner world has a lake, in fact that lake is in the center of it. When I first reached Shikai, I got a brief flash of my shikai blade being flung out of the lake. I assumed it had to do with the Arthurian legend and Excalibur. I love reading about living world fairy tales, the legend of Arthur was one of my favorites. Yet I always sympathized with the symbol of the Knight and King, rather than the symbol of the princess.

"I also think, that Saeyamaru's gift of being able to control water totally clashes with the image of the Knight's squire that he adopted when he formed in my head. You'd expect a zanpakuto like that to have something to do with Human legends surrounding knighthood, and nothing to do with water. I think Saeyamaru is hiding why I can control water like that."

"And you've been trying to find out?"

"Every time I dive into my inner world and attempt to enter the lake, I'm either thrown back out or the water freezes to ice, preventing me from entering." Sakura replied. "Its maddening."

"I see. I can help you find out if you want?"

"how?"

"There's a spell that allows shinigami to enter each other's inner worlds. Come with me."

Sakura followed her captain obediently. "You think he'll come to heal with my boss telling him to? He's capricious as a cottonwood seed on the wind."

"Do you have a better idea? Zanpakuto should obey their masters, and they shouldn't hide anything from them except in the matter of attaining shikai and bankai."

"He's also jealous that I spent so much time learning advanced kidou instead of indulging him."

"I see." Soi Fong turned into a quiet courtyard. "The pond here should do." She gestured for Sakura to sit across from her. Soi Fong placed her blade across her lap, sitting Indian style and Sakura did the same. "Close your eyes, enter your world, then focus on opening the veil for me to enter as well."

A few seconds later, Sakura landed on the grass. She could hear the tinny sound of a radio off in the trees.

She closed her eyes, and a few seconds later Soi Fong landed on the grass next to her. "This way." Sakura took off at an easy run through the trees, and about a hundred yards away the women came to a lake shrouded in mist.

The origin of the sound of the radio became clear. Sitting on the lake shore was a young man, about fourteen or fifteen, dressed in chain mail and leather. An eight legged horse was grazing not so far away, and the teen was fooling around with things that Sakura had been known to play with when her duties were through. A guitar and blank sheet music, a human radio that she babied like some humans did their cars, a pile of brightly colored yarn and a half knitted blanket made of some kind of sapphire blue material. These were things that decorated her part of the barracks.

"Saaaaaaaakkuuuuuuu!" The teenager still spoke like a six year old. "You came! You came! You brought Taichou-chan tooooooo!" he squealed, trying to glomp Soi Fong. Sakura grabbed him by the back of his hood and he fell in the grass. "But she's preeeeetttty! I wanna hug her! You wanna hug her too Saku! I know you do! You worship her like you do that Yoruichi character you keep reading about."

"Jeeeeze, Saeyamaru growing up didn't help your mentality did it?"

"Nope! Until you unlock all the secrets of my shikai, my mind won't catch up to my body." Saeyamaru said happily. "So what do you want?"

"Whats in the lake?" Sakura asked.

"You can't go in there! Its sceeeeerrry!"

"What's so scary about it?" Soi Fong asked.

"There's a really big mean dragon down there! And lots of stone columns like something out of Ancient Greece, and there are freaky statues down there!"

"A sunken ruin?" Sakura asked.

"Its not ruined! Its /his/ home!"

"Who?"

"The dragon!"

"We want to talk to this dragon." Soi Fong told Saeyamaru. "Where is he?"

"In the lake! Don't say I warned you!"

Sakura turned to Soi Fong. "Taichou, shall we?"

"Its your mind, lead the way."

Sakura leapt up into the air and plunged headfirst into the water. Soi Fong followed her. The two of them swam as far down as they could get. For some reason, maybe because it was Sakura's head, she didn't seem to need to go up for air, and neither did the captain.

As they reached the bottom, Sakura took in a shocking sight.

Statues were scattered across the bottom of the lake. Each one was shaped like a different Greek God, and they circled the shrine like totems in an Indian village. When they touched down, they got a good look at four figures in the center of the shrine.

On either side were statues, one was Saeyamaru riding his pony as he'd looked like when Sakura first met him. The second was Saeyamaru as he was when they left him on the bank. That statue was glowing a bright sapphire color.

Behind those two statues a third statue, much larger than the others, stood. But every time Sakura looked at it, her eyesight turned blurry, the statue itself turned into a disk of blackness preventing her from viewing its identity and left the girl wishing that Sakura could indeed view its face.

And in the center of these three statues sat a statue of a dragon, on his head was an unusual item. A crown of ice, with the symbols astronomically associated with the Greek Gods carved into it. In the center of the crown sat a triple moon symbol made out of ice, with a sundisk directly behind the triple moon sign.

The dragon slowly started to glow sapphire, and the statue came alive, turning into an actual dragon. The water began to seethe and bubble, and Soi Fong tugged on Sakura's shirt, pointing up. The message was clear, get out of there!

The two women swam upwards, and Sakura gasped as she was finally able to take a breath.

The dragon breeched the water, appearing before them. It rose up into the air and hovered, glaring downwards at Sakura. **"Sooooooo…"** It rumbled. **"You finally found me!" **

Sakura called up. "What the hell are you??? Are you part of Saeyamaru?"

"**In a manner of speaking."** The dragon growled. **"Though I have been with you for far, far longer. When you died, I became a part of you. When you became a shinigami, I settled into your mind, and Saeyamaru came from my heart and your heart. He is that which you read about, every fairytale of knights and kings." **

A span of water in front of Sakura froze solid, shimmering as it played images like a movie theater. Sakura's eyes turned disturbingly blank, and non responsive, and Soi Fong could see what could only be a memory flashing over the span of ice.

A cute little girl, who resembled Sakura only a child was playing in the dust in a ruined crop field. "SAKURAAAAAA!" Another girl her age whined. "What are you doing all this for? You think you can bring rain when that Indian shaman failed?"

"I know I can if I get the circle just right."

"What a loser! I'm going home to tell mom you're doing witchcraft again! You're going to be in big trouble!"

The Sakura in the picture took a stick and drew a circle in the dust, then she began to dance, drawing sigils around the circle and chanting. "Oh mighty gods of water and rain! Bring back the life! End the pain! Return Persephone to Demeter's embrace, that flowers and green might come back to this place!"

A faint sapphire glow flared up around the circle. Then it faded. No rain, no clouds. "OH COME ON!"

Silence.

"I know I did something!" Sakura shrilled. "I KNOW! I DID!" The girl stomped her foot.

There was another flare of blue light. **"leave this place."**

The girl turned. "Leave!??? NO! Not until you give me the rain!"

"**The rains are not destined to return."** The small glow became brighter. **"These years of dust and sand are a destined punishment by Demeter. You ploughed the plains land under like it was yours to rape and pillage, in punishment, you will not have rain until those that Hold Power realize their sins and make amends to the Mother Goddess for the suffering they put her through!" **

"But I want rain! I'd rather die than live in this horrible dusty place another minute!"

"**If you do not leave this place, and return home to your mother, that can be arranged." **

"Are you threatening me? Do you really think a disembodied voice summoned by a magic circle can kill me? I'm solid! You aren't!"

"**Not by my claw shall your death arrive, but by Gaia's anger."**

"I'm not budging from this spot until you bring rain!"

"**So be it, die here."** The voice responded.

There was silence, the memory blurred, the morning wore on with the girl sitting there. And then all of a sudden, on the horizon, Soi Fong could make out a blur. A very, very large, black, blurry wall rapidly advancing on the girl. As she looked up, the child's eyes turned huge. "Oh shit! OH SHIT! A black blizzard!" she got up and ran towards a smaller dot on the horizon.

Unfortunately, to get home, the girl had to run towards the dust storm. She shrilled, terrified. "He warned me! HE WARNED ME! It's a black blizzard! Its on its way!"

The blackness swept over the girl, and Soi Fong heard coughing. "Oh no, oh no!" The girl cried as she was engulfed. Soi Fong heard coughing, choking. Then a voice echoing. **"I can't breathe, I left my scarf hanging on the door! I left it hanging on the door and now I'm going to die."**

Soi Fong heard screaming, heard a bright sapphire glow. The girl was screaming. "HELP MEEEEE! PLEASE SOMEBODY HELP ME!"

The glow faded, Soi Fong heard Sakura's voice say softly, pathetically, **"wherever the clouds have gone, let me follow. Let me go somewhere that the green of Persephone's innocence never faded. Where Heroes walk as they did in days of old. Where there are monsters, and archers and lovers and villains and magic in every silver note, and every golden sword. Take me far away, where every breath is a fairytale, and every heartbeat, every step, every sword strike is never in vain. Let me be someplace with people who care for me, and people I care for as well, where I can live with warmth, and love, and peace." **

The image faded. Replaced by a blurry image. Two figures in darkened suits, members of the patrol corps! They scanned the area, one of them kneeling down slightly to look at the ground. "Are you sure you sensed something Hochi?"

"Yes, it was in this area. I'm fairly certain there's a spiritually aware human near here. There was a ring of blue glass a little ways back, the glass was filled with traces of Reiatsu. It was burned there by a human with spiritual powers."

"Well if there was one, odds are they're dead now."

"You're right. It's a child." The man knelt next to the crumpled corpse and the soul of the child covered in dust next to it. "Poor thing, she's exhausted." He sighed, drawing his blade. "She's unconscious, but she can be konso'd back to the soul society." He raised his blade, stamping the unconscious girl on the head with it. "Here you go little thing. Go far from here, where the land is green, and rest peacefully."

"**I was a water dragon, summoned by the girls' witchcraft." **The dragon told Soi Fong. **"Less than an hour before her death. I could not save her from the disaster known as Black Sunday, for it was a destined punishment by the Goddess of the Earth, Gaia, and she is far greater a force than I. I could bring her no rain, no warmth, and in the end I could not spare her life. At the moment of her death, she released a massive amount of Reiatsu, getting the attention of the shinigami patrolling the area. **

"**The circle she made bound my soul to the poor girl, and solidified the ring she made in the dust into glass. If the shinigami had not so hastily konso'd her, we might have been separated. But no, he didn't even wait for her to awaken as a whole. Her zanpakuto spirit is a combination of my power cursed to her, and her own resonance with the image of the Knight in Shining armor. She even rides the Horse Slepnir, the eight legged and swiftest of the Midgard Steeds. The only horse that is fast enough to sate her desire for speed in battle." **

"**She fell into a trance when I showed you how she died. I did this because she didn't need to see herself pass. Tell her what happened when you both awaken, and farewell. Do not disturb my slumber again Captain Fong. For while she adores you as much as she has her Hero Sagas, I have no affection for the Gods of Death other than my Sakura." **

Just like that, the vision faded. Soi Fong was back in the courtyard. And Gwen was asleep.

The Captain sighed, scooping the slight Seated Officer up in her arms and carrying her back to the barracks. She tucked the girl in, and left a note on her door. _See me in the morning, sleep well. I'll move your shift to the afternoon, so don't worry about being up for dawn patrols._


End file.
